Art. 18.3 stipulates that members of the election administration (that is, members of the election commission and staff), are not allowed to be party members for the term of their office in the election administration. Apparently, the provision aims to reduce the parties’ influence on the election administration. In Art. 19 on rights and responsibilities, a new para. 3 also appropriately declares that an EC member is not a representative of the election-subject which may have appointed him/her, and that in his/her activities, the member shall be independent and subject only to the Constitution and the law. Furthermore, Art. 21 sets out the conditions under which the term of office of commission members can be terminated prior to its expiration. From reading this article, it appears that only PEC members can be recalled by the appointing party (Art. 21.2 h). However, it must be admitted that, in practice, the members of the election commission have not acted politically independently up to now. Observers of the 2003 parliamentary elections expressed serious concerns over the political interference in the election commissions’ work, in particular at the district and precinct level.
